


Stay Puppy Love

by toddykun



Series: Tumblr Prompts [6]
Category: Darkwing Duck (Cartoon 2018), DuckTales (Cartoon 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Creatures & Monsters, Dorks in Love, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gosalyn Being The Hecking Best, M/M, Mutual Pining, Werewolf Launchpad McQuack, oh so much pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-18
Updated: 2019-09-18
Packaged: 2020-10-21 06:49:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20689283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toddykun/pseuds/toddykun
Summary: It was like a dream. Drake wondered if it ever had to end.





	Stay Puppy Love

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MobMode](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MobMode/gifts).
  * Inspired by [It Will Come Back](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20551826) by [MobMode](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MobMode/pseuds/MobMode). 

> This is a request for the wife, who i love and adore. the prompt was “No, sorry, you laughed. I…I never saw it before. It’s— pretty.” + Drakepad and that really ran away from me lol
> 
> hope yall like it!

It had been unnerving at first, the protective but insistent eyes following Drake around the farm as he worked.

Now it was comfortable, somewhat expected. Drake didn’t know if he could work normally anymore if he didn’t know there were big, watchful eyes carefully hovering over his frame and Gosalyn’s, Launchpad simply watching from a distance (or not) as they went on their day and keeping them company. It was a reassuring presence, more than Drake expected a werewolf to be.

It was a soft day, the sun just warming up the farm, the air clear and comfortingly breeze every now and then as autumn got closer. Launchpad had been feeling better, he almost didn’t need the crutch anymore, and he had been running even, Gosalyn in his back like a little joyful cowgirl, happier riding Launchpad that she was when the neighbor’s farm let her ride the ponies. It was a sight to behold, he would say, a sight to which his heart liked to sing with.

These were dreamy days, Drake could only hope the problems could not reach them there. Especially Launchpad, in his opinion he had been through enough. Not that anyone was asking for his opinion really. But if Launchpad could stay there to escape his problems, well. That might as well be a dream.

He knew Gosalyn was coming even before he heard her when he saw Launchpad’s ears and tail picking up towards a sound he personally couldn’t hear. He prepared himself for impact.

“I finished, dad!” And there she was, with her ponytails moving as she ran to him and almost tackled him to the ground for the force of her hug. He smiled automatically, but still raised a skeptical brow at her.

“All your chores?”

“All of them!”

Drake narrowed his eyes, still not convinced. “What about the chickens? And Ginger?”

“Uhhhh…”

“Uhhhh? What does _uhhhh_ mean?”

Launchpad got closer to them, Gosalyn immediately gave him a big hug that he corresponded with a smile as big as his whole being. _Be still_, Drake implored to his heart.

“Gosalyn,” he called again, Gosalyn clicked her tongue looking at him with a pout as she detached herself from Launchpad. He knew what that meant. “Gosalyn, chores first, television later. That’s the deal.”

"But I don’t want the TV right now, I want to pick up some flowers today! Can we do that now?” Gosalyn begged, putting up her best pleading eyes and the littlest, cutest pouty mouth she had in her arsenal. Drake scoffed, knowing his heart was still getting accustomed to deny Gosalyn when she put that face. “I need to sell them in the market, dad, my clients are not gonna be happy if I don’t.”

Huh, well it was good to know that Gosalyn had a responsibility towards something, even if that responsibility was having money.

Launchpad’s ears picked up at the word _“flower”,_ and Drake had to oblige himself to not laugh fondly when he noticed to be able to answer to his daughter, by faking that he was actually thinking about it, humming loudly as Gosalyn grabbed his shirt and insisted. Like he was going to say no, really. “Um, I don’t know…”

Gosalyn groaned, pulling at his clothes with wild and aggressive insistence, Drake didn’t even move. “Come on, dad, please! Mrs. Emused will not be happy if I don’t have her favorites and she pays good money, you know it.”

Drake’s smile grew comically large at it, “you mean that Mrs. E_mused_ will not be a_mused?”_

Gosalyn groaned louder at the horrible joke, Launchpad actually chuckling under his breath and receiving a satisfied smile from Drake and an accusatory frown from Gosalyn, “Don’t encourage him, LP!”

“Oh, uh, sorry,” Launchpad coughed, just to try to stop his laughing. When it finally died down, he asked hesitantly, “what’s this about flower picking?”

Gosalyn smile grew at that, looking at her dad with wild excitement and giggling happily, Drake had to roll his eyes at that. He knew what she wanted, and he had to admit he wanted that too. He finally sighed, accepting defeat, “ok, ok. We’re going if only to show it to Launchpad.”

Gosalyn screamed in delighted, Launchpad let his head fall to the side in confusion.

“Wait, to show me what?”

“Oh, you’re gonna love it!” Gosalyn jumped at him, Launchpad catching her with ease and still looking confused, and Drake had to pretend the scene didn’t warm his heart as much as it did. “It’s the biggest, coolest flower field this place has!”

Drake didn’t have to look down to know that Launchpad’s tail was wagging like crazy when he saw the look of complete curiosity and glee in his eyes, but he did, if only for the fun of it. He bit a laugh that was about to get out when he saw what he expected.

“Well, let’s pick some things and then we go. Walking. Because there’s still no truck for us.” Gosalyn booed but all Launchpad did was get ahead of him with her on his arms, Gosalyn screaming out of pure joy as Launchpad ran to the house as if his life depended on that.

Drake laughed to himself, picking up the pace even if he knew that he never was going to catch up to Launchpad.

“Hey, you two, wait for me!”

.

His nose was acting like crazy, his eyes looking everywhere open and wide with something that Drake could only attribute to interest. Gosalyn had already lost herself in the flowers, running towards them, giggling happily as she picked flower after flower, but she was still careful when she did that. Drake smiled proud at that but wondered if Launchpad was holding himself up by how worked up he was acting.

Drake’s hand went to his arm, he didn’t know what Launchpad was feeling but he could try to be reassuring. “Hey, if it’s too much, you don’t have to get too close.”

Launchpad smiled down at him, that smile that almost made Drake sigh dreamily every time without a care in the world. Launchpad shook his head vehemently and said with joy, “No, no, I— I have years without being in a place like this. I just— this is incredible, Drake. Thanks, for showing it to me.”

Drake couldn’t help the blush that appeared, but he tried to not bask too much in the appreciation. “Oh, it’s nothing.”

“Nothing?! Drake, how is this nothing!?”

And he extended his arms towards the view as if it was God worthy, and he actually felt a little like an idiot for answering like that only because he was embarrassed. Drake would never get tired of how incredible this place was.

There were kilometers and kilometers of flowers, the different types merging in a symphony of colors and smells, the petals seemed always to change colors and glow brighter than before when the sun slipped its light between them. He felt in a painting every time he came there, or just to keep the theme of the day, a wistful dream. It was magnificent how many flowers where there, how many birds and butterflies could appear around them, but there was one part of the garden that was the best in Gosalyn’s opinion (and his): the Sunflower patch.

It was like a little forest just made me with the tall and bright-colored flowers, it was so easy for Gosalyn to lost herself there and even Drake himself wasn’t that much taller than the flowers, her laugh was the only indicative Drake had to know where she was having the time of her life, playing hide and seek and pointing out to every insect, butterfly or bird she found. It was a place to fall in love with (or in), maybe Gosalyn and he had the same thought when they decided to show it to Launchpad.

_Stay here with us._

Launchpad got distracted by a blue butterfly, almost falling on his butt for trying to follow it with his head only, instead of turning around. Drake laughed to himself, muffling the sound with his hand and that called Launchpad's attention.

“Why do you always do that when you laugh?”

Drake was confused, “Uh, do what?”

“You always…“ Launchpad mimicked the action, hand covering his mouth but Drake couldn’t really answer when Gosalyn’s laugh pierced through the field, jumping between the sunflowers so they could see her, calling Launchpad’s name and challenging him to catch her. Launchpad wasn’t slow to the beat, jumping into the flowers immediately and Drake had to laugh at the obvious shadow that his too-big body was making. He noticed the hand on his beak, and oh, well, maybe he did it all the time.

He shook his head, forgetting about the detail and walking to the sunflowers, picking those flowers and making a list in his head of the seeds that he was going to buy to keep the garden alive. He breathed the sweet air, heard the sound of Launchpad and Gosalyn’s laughter faintly from the distance, encountering more than one butterfly around the flowers, all calmly, until in one step his foot touched fur instead of dirt and he almost jumped with an embarrassing squeak. He looked down, Launchpad laying down in the floor with labored breath and Drake laughed again, his hand again on his beak.

Launchpad heard him anyways, bless those puppy ears. He looked up to him with a soft, tired smile. “Hey, buddy.”

“Couldn’t with Gosalyn?” Drake asked, hovering over the extended werewolf body on the floor. Launchpad smiled brighter at him, as beautiful as it always was, and sat up to address him better with a little of difficulty.

“She has a, um, a lot of spirit,” he commented simply, sounded actually charmed by the detail. Drake found that charming himself. “And she really knows where to apply those tickles.”

Drake snorted at that, “oh yeah, she is really good at that.”

Launchpad looked around, there were only sunflowers around for miles and miles. “How did you two found this place?”

Drake sat down, putting the basket of flowers just beside himself, and started to recall how Gosalyn had found it. He could hear her faint laugh from the distance.

“It was Gos, actually. One day she came running home from the forest the dirtiest she had ever gotten and I lectured her, of course, but she wasn’t even paying attention, rambling on her own about a lady or something and then she dragged me here. It was…it was indescribable. There was some old lady actually, a dog that smiled at Gos when she got closer and she extended a hand to me and asked us to take care of it for her. I always wonder if she, well, if she died or if she was real at all because we never saw her again.”

“It was the most perfect thing anyways, Gosalyn and I take care of it when we can, but this place it’s almost…magical. It’s like it doesn’t need us to hold itself up, but it appreciated what we did, at least. It was like- like it appeared when we needed it the most. We weren’t— we weren’t having too much luck with the farm at that time, but this place? It was like it gave us luck and hope because everything seemed to go better after we found it. It’s like a safe haven, it’s hard to feel sad or upset here, like it can only hold happiness and…”

Drake turned around, Launchpad’s eyes fixated and so seriously concentrated on him that Drake felt uneasy under the attention that he usually basked in. “Sorry, I must be rambling nonsense for you.”

“No, no!” Launchpad reassured him quickly, “It’s great, this is incredible. Drake, I want…” And he held his hand, and he didn’t know how Launchpad could be so careful and soft with them, holding his hand as if it was delicate glass, as if he was scared of breaking him. His heart thundered against his chest, and he was sure he was red now, Launchpad’s careful gaze over him with that charming smile that made Drake a weak, weak man. “Drake, I want to sta—.”

Whatever he was gonna say, they got interrupted by a butterfly of all things. Drake mildly thanked it, his heart couldn’t take any more of his touch.

It posed itself in Launchpad’s nose out of nowhere, Launchpad immediately letting go of his hand to look with wide eyes at his nose. “Drake, are you seeing this?!”

He sounded enthusiastic like a little kid and Drake had to snort at that but he let go an _“uhu_” to let him know he was, in fact, seeing the cute occurrence. He really wished he had a camera right now, with the werewolf looking so silly with the butterfly fluttering its wings in his nose. Until Launchpad sneezed, the butterfly going back to the air and the werewolf immediately whimpered looking at it go. Launchpad looked at him, his smile so big it covered his whole face, “this place is magical!”

Drake nodded, he definitely agreed on that. He caressed the hand that Launchpad had held no less than some seconds ago. “Yeah…what was, uh, what were you gonna tell me?”

“Oh, uh, that, it’s that I, well, I—” Launchpad seemed to be about to tell him something, only to change his mind and say something else. “You shouldn’t be embarrassed for rambling, it can’t be as embarrassing as being defeated by your little daughter.”

Drake smiled fondly at that. “Of course, my little daughter wouldn’t get me on the floor like a mess.”

Launchpad snorted, “Oh, come on, like you don’t have a tickle spot.”

He smiled proudly because he has some advantages, inane advantages but advantages nonetheless. “For your information, mister, I’m actually not easily tickled.”

Launchpad narrowed his eyes with a mischievous smile, his feet started to move like he was about to jump. “Nah. Can’t believe ya.”

“Well, you will have to believe it or—” Drake’s body reacted to that little movement by preparing itself for the run almost by instinct. That should be scary, but Drake was, in front of any kind of self-preservation, ridiculously thrilled by the implication of what that meant. There was a bit of silence before Drake pulled the trigger—, “_or you can prove it.”_

That was enough.

“Come here!” Drake only laughed, running from Launchpad’s grip and only watching behind him to look at how his face hit the ground, shook his whole body and then ran after Drake in four feet.

Drake ran for his life, laughing and losing himself between the sunflowers. When he got really inside the sunflower patch, he looked around, surprised. Where was Launchpad? How did you lose the biggest werewolf you have ever seen in your life in a flower field?

“Gotcha!”

Drake screamed, hitting the dirt and groaning amusedly when two big hands pinned him to the ground suddenly. Launchpad smiled over him, looking quite proud of himself that he could jump Drake and surprise him, and then started to roam his hands everywhere. If Drake was honest, the view over him was making him more flustered than Launchpad trying to encounter his ticklish spot. He started to look more frustrated by the second, and Drake started to look smugger in return. “Oh, come on! You have to have a weak spot.”

“I told you I don’t have one.” And even if he had he wasn’t going to tell him.

Launchpad hummed, “Well if I can’t find it then only someone can.” He smiled, and for the first time in his life, Drake didn’t like it. “Gosalyn!”

Pfft, yeah, like she was gonna come by just calling her one time—.

“Yeah?” Gosalyn appeared out of nowhere between the sunflowers, looking at her dad in the ground with joyful curiosity. Of course that if Launchpad called, she was gonna come. “Did you call LP?”

“Does your dad have a weak spot for tickles?”

Drake’s eyes grew comically large at that. _Oh no._

Gosalyn hummed, “Well—.”

_No, no, no, no, no_. “No, Gosalyn, don’t you dare!”

“Cut my chores!”

“No!”

Gosalyn made a remorseful face that didn’t look faker just because she wanted it to look like that. “Then I’m very sorry, Mr. Dad.” Then she looked at Launchpad with an evil smile. But of course, that was his luck, betrayed by his own daughter. “Launchpad, from his left second rib down, there’s his weak spot.”

Launchpad immediately smiled as he saw Gosalyn walking away and saluting him in some princess mannerism she probably watched on TV. “Many thanks, milady!”

Drake tried to escape but Launchpad’s big hands kept him from even trying to squirm his way out of his grip. Curse the day he thought that could be attractive, he was hating it now. “Gosalyn, come here, you’re grounded!”

“Uh, oh, sorry, dad, can’t hear you over the sound of your laughing!”

“The sound of my laugh—?” And then Launchpad’s hands just as much as grazed his weak spot, and he was gone to the world.

Drake laughed and squirmed in his hold, snorting and screaming Launchpad’s name every now and then, only to start laughing again, so loud and messy that his eyes started to swell up in tears. He couldn’t remember a time when he had laughed so hard, even when Gosalyn had tried to have a tickle fight because the tables turned and they both ended in a laughing mess. Here? Here he was completely at Launchpad’s mercy, hearing his own ugly laugh going through the flower field, he felt his tears slipping over his hot face that he was sure was completely red by now.

“Stop, stop! Please, Launchpad!” That did not have the effect he wanted, Launchpad didn’t hear him, continuing the tickles, but now that wasn’t making him laugh. He was panicking now. Drake did the only thing that came to mind: hit Launchpad as hard as he could and scream, “STOP!”

That did the trick, Launchpad looked like someone had thrown a bucket of cold water over him. He immediately backed up, his face was incredibly red as he looked at Drake finally breathing and washing off his tears.

“What—? What the hell, Launchpad?” Drake held his abdomen carefully, his ribs hurt for so much laughing and he had to take deep breaths to be able to continue talking. “Didn’t you hear me when I said stop the first time?”

“No, sorry, you laughed,” Launchpad said quickly, almost freaking out, and Drake only looked at him with more confusion, pushing Launchpad to ramble more of his panicked explanation. “I…I never saw it before. It’s— pretty, very pretty and I-I wanted to hear more of it, and how you looked when you laughed it was. And I. I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean— I know that doesn’t excuse it but—!”

“You think it’s pretty?” Drake interrupted him, his brain grabbing to that detail and that detail only. The reason why he almost unconsciously covered his beak when he laughed not lose to him.

Launchpad stopped his rambling, thrown out the loop, but he answered anyway, “yes! Yes, of course I do.”

Oh, and Launchpad sounded so sure, so clear and confident about it, Drake didn’t have the heart to deny it, his own insecurities flying out the window with that simple affirmation. “Oh,” was the only thing that got out of his beak, as his breathing tried to come back to normalcy but his heart kept beating hard and fast for a reason that had nothing to do with the tickling. But he couldn’t help but smile.

_Launchpad thinks my laugh is pretty._

Launchpad’s eyes were still on him, he looked like he needed to calm down too, like if he had been in the same predicament that Drake. His face was red and his breathing labored, his hands at every side of Drake’s head, and he still looked…surprised? No, that wasn’t it. It was more like…

“Launchpad?” Drake finally asked when Launchpad kept himself in silence.

“Drake.” His voice was deep and it sent a shiver through his body like lightning, his eyes were serious, half-lidded as he looked at him attentively. His eyes flew to his beak for a moment, then again at his eyes. Launchpad let his body support itself in his arms instead of his hands, getting closer to Drake, his weight over him making him lose his breath and his mind.

_Oh, no._ This was serious.

This wasn’t like the situation in his room, where they weren’t aware, where reactions appeared as natural as breathing. This was different, they knew very well what was happening here.

Launchpad searched something in his face intently, a serious expression he had never seen before. When Launchpad found what he was looking for, he asked softly “Drake, can I—?”

Drake nodded softly, not even listening. Launchpad’s tail started to wag, he looked bashful but that didn’t deter him as he leaned down, just like that time in the room.

But in the room, Drake had the means to escape without having to say a word. He had nowhere to run here, and he didn’t even want to, really. He trusted Launchpad in this, that if he said _stop_ here, he would do so. His hands attached to Launchpad’s shoulder as if he held for dear life, feeling his heart about to burst out from his chest, closing his eyes the closer Launchpad was to him as he leaned down.

He could have this, right? Was he allowed to have it? Wasn’t he too bad of a person sometimes?

Launchpad was here, at his side for circumstances that no one could expect to happen in real life, but it always felt like he was supposed to be here from the start. He wanted him to stay so bad, or to come back. If he had to go, he wanted him to come back and stay with them. Launchpad liked it here, right? But…

_Who could assure him that at the moment that Launchpad went back to his life, the one before them, he would want to come back ever again?_

And that? That made him doubt, that planted a seed on his brain whose vines got to the most recondite space of his mind with this anxiety and left only a terrible thought: Launchpad wasn’t going to stay, he had another family, other people he cared about too much to go somewhere else. Somewhere else with— with him and Gosalyn. Drake couldn’t do this to Gosalyn, he couldn’t do this to himself.

And the thought infected his actions with poison, making him frown and groan and turn his head to the side, avoiding Launchpad. He saw from the corner of his eye Launchpad backing up surprised, almost with terror.

"Drake?” It sounded so unlike Launchpad, like a scolded puppy, his tail and ears down.

Drake pushed him softly as his only answer, Launchpad immediately complied, giving Drake the perfect space he needed for his mind to stop reeling and for him to sit up. He asked hesitantly, “can I change my mind?”

Launchpad didn’t waste a second, he immediately nodded. “Of course, no matter what.”

“Launchpad, I—”

“Dad! Launchpad!”

Drake turned around, immediately getting up and Launchpad followed suit, his eyes full of worry attached to his frame. Drake ignored it at the best of his capacity, he felt bad for doing it, but he wasn’t sure he could confront Launchpad like this. Instead, he looked at Gosalyn running to them, excited smile on her face.

“I picked a lot of flowers! We can go now, guys,” she said proudly as if they finished a very important mission.

Drake chuckled, “oh, to finish your chores at home?”

Gosalyn frowned, clicking her tongue. “I was hoping you’ve forgotten.”

Drake looked at Launchpad for a moment, their eyes connecting with a message that they didn’t know if the other understood, and then back to his daughter with a smug smile. “Like I could forget, little missy.”

Launchpad thought to himself, that maybe Drake wasn’t really referring to Gosalyn’s chores, but he wasn’t really sure as to what else exactly.

“I’m going to go find my basket and then we can go home, okay?”

Gosalyn sighed but she nodded, then she looked at Launchpad. “Come on, Launchpad, help me with some of the flowers. I grabbed a looooooot of them.”

Drake ignored the eyes following him before he heard Launchpad accept and move between the flowers, probably following Gosalyn. Drake finally sighed, letting go of so much tension with that single action. What was he gonna do? What was he supposed to feel now? Should he feel sad, betrayed, idiotic, disappointed? Should he tell Launchpad that it wasn’t that he didn’t want to kiss him? That he wanted him to stay but he was scared of the rejection?

Drake groaned to himself until he finally found the basket of sunflowers. He sighed, crouching down to grab it but he stopped when he noticed the blue butterfly happily posed in there.

“What do you think I should do?” He asked the blue butterfly as it could understand him. The butterfly simple fluttered its wings for a moment and then went away, ignorant and free of any mundane love problems. Drake looked at it, wistfully. “Well, at least one of us can ignore all this mess.”

Was that really true though? Couldn’t he simply…bask in this? Enjoy the feeling instead of dying over it? Could he leave it the upsetness here? He went back from where he came with that question in his mind, following Gosalyn’s loud voice through the flower field.

When he finally got out of the sunflower patch, he stopped at the sight of Gosalyn propped up in Launchpad’s shoulders, too many flowers bursting in their arms. Gosalyn was laughing to her heart content to something Launchpad was telling her, the werewolf’s tail wagging like there was no tomorrow and looking at his daughter with an adoration that he thought he would never see in anyone except himself.

Drake walked to them, and as always that he saw them together, his heart decided to sing a song he was starting to get accustomed to, a dreamy one that filled his brain with unlikely thoughts and a torrid desire to keep time stopped at that time and place. He didn’t want that, to get used to something that wasn’t realistic. But he did want it, for the unrealistic to become possible. Launchpad fed the flame everyday responsibly until there was nothing else in his brain.

Call him egoistic, or a fool, but if this all had an expiration date, he wasn’t about to take any second of it for granted.

“Well,” he said as he got close to them, grabbing Launchpad’s arm with naturalness, and ignoring the bulging eyes that Launchpad was throwing at him. “Let’s go home, yeah?”

“Yeah!” Gosalyn immediately agreed.

Launchpad took a moment, but he did respond. A little, hopeful smile on his face. “…home, yeah.”

Hopeful for what? Drake could only guess. He hoped it wasn’t a wrong guess.

His hold on Launchpad’s arm tightened, his fingers losing on soft fur, the feeling that everything was where it should be not leaving his mind even if the facts were different, how normal this felt, he decided to bask in the feeling instead of rejecting it. He was sure his feathers were just as red as before, that the blush hadn’t died down, but he did not care.

He could have this, just, no kissing. His heart couldn’t take that and survive. Be that the signal that he had fallen too deep, irreparably and without conscience, for Launchpad. For now, he would let himself have the wish that Launchpad, in the end, decided to stay with them. Imagining a future that looked just like this day.

With Gosalyn smiling and Launchpad by his side.

**Author's Note:**

> hope yall liked it!!!
> 
> come bother me at my tumblr if yall want: @mmacabrera


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